Ryanair Passengers may have noticed something missing from their cabins. Photo / Unsplash, Portuguese Gravity
Ryanair Passengers may have noticed something missing from their cabins. Photo / Unsplash, Portuguese Gravity
There's nothing more disconcerting than realising you've forgotten something when heading on holiday. Except, maybe, realising your airline has forgotten something…
A passenger on a budget carrier noticed there was a whole row of seats missing from his plane.
Sat in row twelve, Tom Cotter observed his Ryanair flight jumped straight to row fourteen, missing out an ominous number.
"Bizarre how there is no row 13 on Ryanair flights. Why ever not? Superstition? Surely not!" he tweeted on his way to Seveille.
The airline has previously claimed it is a quirk of the American manufacturers of the Boeing 737s.
The "tradition" of leaving out the 13th seat is something many carriers do out of deference to superstitious passengers.
The number is considered unlucky in many parts of the world: 13 is a witches' coven, the number of Judas Iscariot and Friday the 13th is also an inauspicious date for travellers.
Other airlines jumping a row of seats include Air France and German carrier Lufthansa, which also do not number row 17. (This superstition is blamed on the Roman numerals being an anagram of VIXI or 'I have finished living'.)
Elsewhere, Cathay of Hong Kong avoids rows 4 or 14 for the numbers' sounding like the Cantonese word for 'death'.
It is simply bad manners to provide a passenger with a ticket for 'death row'.
"Triskaidekaphobia" or the fear of the number 13 has been blamed for many travel traditions including high-rise hotels missing the thirteenth floor on plans.
13th step: Some Airlines like Ryanair skip the 13th row of seats, whereas Qantas do not. Photo / Seatguru
However, it is unfair to blame the manufacturer for following superstitions. Qantas' fleet of 737-800s keep their row 13. As does budget airline Easyjet, and British Airways.
Seat numbering is something that airlines decide for themselves, although renumbering inauspicious aircraft is a long held tradition.
Those Ryanair customers flying from London to Milan are likely to notice the missing row, but not that their 737-8 plane was previously named the 737-MAX.
After a 20-month global flight ban following a safety inquiry over pilot software, the US manufacturer renamed the model the 737-8.
Last December the Irish airliner bought 75 Boeing 737 MAX jets with a list price of $13 billion, a very competitive price.
Air New Zealand avoids the whole problem of rows 13, 14 and 17 by changing their business class numbering. Photo / Seat Guru
Air New Zealand does not fly Boeing 737s in their fleet. However they bypass the problem entirely on the 787s by jumping from row seven to 23, by counting each business-class seat as a separate row. There is no seat 13 but instead a 4J.
While aviation is full of quirks and superstitions, airlines are content to make their own luck.
